Tightrope
by Mirrordance
Summary: Sam's dying, and Dean can't seem to find it in himself not to make the same mistake all over again. Set Season 4.


Author:Mirrordance

Title:**Tightrope**

Summary:Set Season 4. Sam's dying again, and Dean can't seem to find it in himself not to make the same mistake all over again.

**Note**:

Thanks to all who read and especially all who reviewed _Stronger_: cheetahluke, deangirl1, I'mcalledZorro, apieceofcake, adder574, and of course Phoebe. Thank you guys so much. I'm sorry I won't be working on a chapter two to that one showing how Dean may have gotten tagged, haha, but I hope you like this new offering too, or any of the ones that may follow _Stronger_. All the best!

" " "

**Tightrope**

" " "

Dean Winchester was not on his knees, _not this time_.

Neither was his poor brother, whom he had laid flat on his back. Likely it was due to some practically-attributable excuse; the injury was bad, a blind man could spot it, the deaf could hear, the very air around them was bleak and bleeding. The injury was lethal. Better to be horizontal.

Dean had once said _I got you_, right? He had once said a lot of things.

_Come here, let me look at you..._

He was, by perfect contrast, quiet now, saying nothing and distinctly_ not _looking at Sam, focusing instead on his own useful, scarred, lined hands working, quick and precise, knowing where to go, where to press and hold, unlike the eyes that stayed quite stubbornly away from his younger brother's anguished face.

_It's not even that bad, it's not even that bad, _he had said back then also, but back then it might have been a lie. If he had known his brother had a chance, he'd have said less and done more, right? _Like now_. Doing more, saying less. But though the words were non-existent, the actions had taken over the lie, because Sam was dying as much now as he had been in Cold Oak, except this time, Dean seemed to have succeeded in lying to himself.

_Listen to me, we're gonna patch you up, okay? You'll be as good as new_, he had said.

But now it was Sam's turn, begging, begging to be looked at, begging to be listened to, and Dean wasn't hearing him.

"Dean," he gasp-gagged, blood bubbling for his mouth, "Listen to me."

"Sammy, Sammy," Dean said with a merciless grunt, being quite busy stemming the blood from the seemingly wide-open _damned _stomach, "What a chick, always wanting to talk."

"Dean," Sam begged again, and cried out with the pressure of Dean's hands. His older brother barely even winced, "Look...at me."

Castiel wondered if Dean was consciously doing everything differently, this time around. Everything different from that Cold Oak nightmare, as if changing things could change the outcome. No more knees. No more looking. No more calling or listening. No more assurances. Was this an extension of _We-are-not-making-the-same-mistake-all-over-again_?

"Where the hell is Bobby with the damned kit," Dean muttered to himself.

Tears were streaking down the corners of Sam's eyes. The injury was bad. The pain was bad. The situation was bad. Dean was calm. Dean was productive. Dean was being everything he hadn't been before.

_We are not making the same mistake all over again_, he had said in Indiana, convincing his younger brother against making demon-deals or anything even vaguely resembling that to save his life. Was tonight like that one? Change the circumstances, change the outcome?

"What took you so long, old-timer?" Dean had greeted the returnee, who was out of breath. Dean would have run in his stead, but at the time they had agreed on tasks, his hands were deep in his brother's side, trying to stem the bleeding. His hands have returned there now too.

"Had to go up the road a little," Bobby Singer replied, as he opened the bag and assembled their miscellany of field medical supplies, "Grabbed a signal to call an ambulance. Figured I should do that before running for the kit, get them here ASAP." He glanced uncertainly at the gaping wound, not bothering to say what everyone, save perhaps Dean, knew at this point: that they could do nothing in the field, really, for something that looked like that.

Dean shrugged off the reply, "Get me that morphine shot before anything else, Bobby, the pain's bad."

"No," Sam moaned, "Wait..."

"A little less conversation, Sammy," Dean told his gruffly, quoting the King, "A little more action. All this aggravation--"

"Shot's gonna knock me out," Sam gasped, shaking his head vigorously. "Gotta say--"

The syringe was raised in Bobby's Singer's still, steady hand. Hands steadier than his eyes, like Dean, as his gaze shifted from brother to brother.

"Bobby," Dean said, flatly, "What the hell are you waiting for?"

Singer didn't want to do it. Didn't want to give the younger Winchester the shot that would close his eyes sooner than they had to. Because if they closed now, then they'd be closed forever. He knew what that wound looked like. Sam was a goner. If he wanted to be fully-awake and clear-headed for as long as he could, if he wanted to lucidly say a few final things to his stubborn older brother, he had every right to.

"Bobby!" Dean exclaimed, "What the hell?"

"Oh God," Sam groaned, "God..."

"Give him the damn shot!" Dean snapped, "He wants the damn shot!"

"No he doesn't," Bobby said, looking at Sam, seeing the younger man's eyes shine in gratitude.

"Bobby, stick that in him or so help me god--"

"Let him say his piece," Bobby said, "And then I'll do what you want."

"You give him the mike you'll never get it back," Dean said, though his eyes were beginning to dawn with some panic now, "And he'll be fine, okay? But he might not be if he goes into shock from the damn pain, now give him the damn shot."

"Dean," Sam sobbed, unmasked now, as all are in death, especially in ones such as these. The Lord had bled and cried too, who were all else to be any better, any stronger, than He...

"Shut up, Sam--"

"You said," Sam said, voice lowering to a whisper, now, "We are not gonna make the same mistake all over again."

"Sam--" The older Winchester's voice shakes for the first time, now.

"You said," Sam struggled, grabbing his brother desperately by the arm, "You know what it's paved with, and you know where it's going."

"This isn't--"

"You said," Sam gasped, eyes fluttering, "You said you were sorry. You knew... 't was... your f-fault, y-you knew what, what it's d-done, t-t-to me, and-nd you said, you were _sorry_."

"Sammy..." Dean whispered, and they were both shaking now.

"Don't forget," Sam breathed, writhing, like a soul trying to find its way out of its mortal cage, cumbersome flesh... "D-don't forget. What you said."

His eyes fluttered, and dimmed, and drifted to the skies, where his soul longed to go.

"No, no, no..." Dean begged.

Castiel thought that things were starting to look familiar now.

"Sam!" Dean cried.

" " "

Bobby Singer was assuredly rendered unconscious somewhere.

Singer wasn't making the same mistakes all over again too, apparently, and had barely let his eyes leave his younger charge. But he was likely felled by the devices of arguably one of the most creative hunters in the world. Dean would have scratched his head uneasily about it, as ashamed of himself about the important things as always. But it was the truth; this was the man who had strategically exorcised a town with a skeleton crew of himself and four people, all backed into a corner. On a smaller scale, this was the man who had tossed a cursed rabbit's foot into the instinctive catch of a great thief, making her an accomplice in its destruction. The list went on. He was creative, yes, and tonight, his determination was unparalleled also, and there was no arguing that.

Therefore, _Bobby Singer was assuredly rendered unconscious somewhere_, such that when Dean took his younger brother's body to the House of the Lord, he was alone.

Sure, he had kicked at the doors of the church but it was still a good start, Castiel thought, a very, very fair one, considering the last time this happened, Dean had driven drunkenly desperate to a crossroads, half-hoping he would die along the way to end his misery, living, and then making a deal that had tossed him into a worse fate.

Dean Winchester in a church... _quite_ different from the last time Sam Winchester died, and maybe Dean wouldn't be making the same mistakes all over again after all.

The Church was a large one, empty, austere, lit only by the moonlight seeping from the open double-doors, the candles on the altar, and the candles on the petitions before the multitude of saintly statues lining the walls, winking with the light of wishes and prayers.

One of them, of note, was the statue of Saint Jude, the patron saint of the impossible. Some had said, the patron saint of lost causes also. Castiel wondered if Dean knew that. Almost all of the candles beneath his feet were lit. It was a strange, strange world.

The cold, forbidding gray of the church made it seem as if the floor went along the wall and up to the ceiling, fluidly, the dull color broken sporadically by the stained glass windows, that in the daylight would have given everything a brighter glow. Tonight, they looked forlorn.

The fourteen stained glass windows in the church showed the Way of the Cross, which depicted the Passion, the final hours of Jesus. Dean passed them by practically blind, paying them no mind at all as he moved down the length of the aisle, carrying his brother's body, not noticing at all that he stopped by the one that showed Jesus falling beneath the weight of the Cross He was carrying.

Every hero had a cross to bear, that's where the popular phrase was coined from. _ Via crucis_, the way of the cross_..._

Dean breathed hard as he bore Sam's body in his arms. It was by no means easy, but the manner with which he met his challenge was as if this was something he must have done many times before, because the parts fit in all the right places, his younger brother's larger bulk aside. Lolling head met determined crook of neck and shoulder, motionless curved back and folded knees met the unyielding space between arm and forearm, like pieces of a puzzle, one completing the other, and there was an undeniable sadness about that, especially with their forced separation.

_Now_, Dean let himself fall to his knees.

"What do I have to do?" he asked, softly.

There was no answer.

There wasn't going to be one, and this was not news. This is not the first anguished prayer in the world, would not be the last. Christ himself had fallen on his knees and prayed, had looked up to His Father and asked.

Tears fell from his eyes, large and fat, and far-reaching. From eye-corners to cheeks, down to his chin where they hung, and then fell on the equally cold and still Sam or the marble floor.

He sniffed, cleared his throat, and said louder, clearer, "What do I have to do?"

It's harder isn't it, Castiel reflected, to know for certain that someone was watching and listening and yet not responding to you. Dean had once known, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that there was no God in the world. He had lived on that premise, made a life for himself. Made a death for himself, too. Who else would, after all, since there was no God?

"If you do this," Dean said, voice strained, but his eyes were resolute, "Anything you ask. _Anything _you ask."

Castiel knew that. Everyone did. For Dean, it had always been anything for Samuel. If the Lord answered the car or his soul, if the Lord had answered a pledge of chastity, or poverty. If the Lord had asked for him to wear the cloth. If the Lord asked for both arms and both legs.

"What do I have to do?" Dean asked again, and it sounded a little too much like _What am I supposed to do?!_

" " "

Castiel frowned, as things began to look undeniably all too-familiar.

It started with the cry, didn't it? _Sam_!, Dean had called - he had cried - and if any sound could have pierced the barrier between life and death, it would have been a cry just like that. Reversion to the mistakes of the past had started with that. And then with Dean falling on his knees in Church. And then asking what he had to do to bring his brother back. And then the deafening reply of silence. And then the sound of his precious car roaring out into the night, almost personifying his determination and bubbling rage.

Castiel finally let himself be seen, and sat in the back of the car. Sam Winchester's corpse was littering the passenger seat.

It was a testament to Dean's distraction that it took him a long moment to notice. A glance at the rear-view mirror, and eyes widened. The tires screeched as the Impala came to a dead stop. Dean caught his breath, and kept his eyes on the road, now still in his view, no longer rushing past in a mad blur.

"I wondered," Castiel said wistfully into the quiet, "If we would have problems with you."

"If you won't help me," Dean growled at him, "Get the fuck outta my car."

"No one will come to your crossroad," Castiel guaranteed him, "They know the Lord watches you. And they know I am here."

"It's all you both do," Dean snapped, "Get out. Get the hell away from me. At least gimme a damn chance."

"You've been down this road--"

"I don't care," Dean argued, "I... I _can't_."

Castiel looked at him expectantly, and he averted his gaze from the mirror.

"I can't," Dean said, quieter now, and shakier, "I really, actually _can't_."

Castiel frowned. _Can't _care?

"Not about anything," Dean added softly, "Not when he's gone."

"Your fates are not tied in that way," Castiel said, "No one's is. Do you understand this? You cannot each die at different times and resurrect and die again until you end in the same instant. Things do not work that way."

"I don't know what to tell you," Dean admitted, "Can you do it?"

"I can," Castiel answered, mildly. "It doesn't mean that I should."

"Why not?" Dean snapped, "Is there a _lesson _to be had here, huh? A _lesson_?" he said it twice, and with equal measure of spite, "So fine, whatever, I get it already. He's my weak spot, everyone knows that. Exploit it. As long as he's here, your god will find no better go-to-guy than me. Use Sam as a lever, whatever, just bring him the fuck back. 'Cos I can promise you right now... he stays dead, and you've lost me. He stays dead, and I'm playing for the other damn team--"

"If there were any other lesson," Castiel said, "What would it be?"

"I don't have the fricking time--"

"Dead is dead," Castiel reminded him, "He will not go anywhere. You can bear to speak with me a moment."

Dean glared at him from the mirror. "The only thing I've learned so far, is that your god is not taking the damn wheel well enough."

"Are you asking me why bad things happen to good people?"

"I'm not asking anything," Dean snapped, "I was fine when I didn't know you or your god was around. At least the damn rules were clear. All I had to do was get by on my own."

"You can't get by just on your own, Dean."

"And I can't get by with you around," Dean pointed out, "So I'm exactly where I was. And Sam's... exactly where he was too." His voice softened, "I don't... I don't beg, you know that. I think there's something off about putting a man on his knees. But I'll do what I have to. Bring him back. Or step out and let someone else who will, do."

Castiel watched him for a long, quiet moment. "One wonders sometimes, at the marvel of brothers. How they get along, though they are so different. The thing about Sam, is that he is all about power. He equips himself, constantly, things that would improve his capacity for success in any situation. He had taken to his schooling that way, and hunting too. You, on the other hand, are all about control, the control of situations. As if you knew you otherwise would not have the strength to weather things beyond it. You constantly need to know where your brother is, where your things are, and you have an almost complete resistance to change.

"For all Sam's power," Castiel continued, "He could never save you. All the times you have stood at death's door, at hell's doors, there was always something lacking in his solutions, or they are accomplished by someone else. For all your control, you could never stop him from anything. An interesting dynamic. You are both weakest where you long to be the most strong. Your desire to protect him is will get you killed, always, can you see that?"

"I don't care--"

"You should," Castiel said, "Because you dying... that will make him lose his way. That is the only thing that has ever made him lose his way.

"Love is a funny, funny thing," he went on, "One of the Lord's stranger inventions. For instance... you do know that you are to love God above all else, am I correct? As He demands you must trust and follow. The best of his servants have been willing to sacrifice their own children, did you know that?"

"Why are you telling me this?" Dean asked, voice clipped and anguished as he shook his head, "Please, just leave us alone if you can't do anything. _Please _just leave us alone."

"Did you know that?" Castiel pressed.

Dean stared hard at him from the rear view mirror. Took a deep, shaky breath. He looked defeated, and that was a very, very rare thing. "I've heard about it. Is that what this is?"

"It might be."

"So I can't give him up," Dean said, "I fucking failed. Test over. Just... give him back."

"You are not supposed to love anyone more than God," Castiel told him, "Sam is a vice. Sam is a hindrance."

"I don't know your god, why should I care about him?" Dean asked, "I never had the chance to. But if he is what you say he is... if he is the one who gives everyone good things, if he is the one who gave me my brother... then Sam is all that I know of God. And Sam – Sammy – my brother I loved. Sam I never took for granted. Sam I gave everything I ever had to. If God is the one who gave me Sam, I did all right by Him, right? I did right by Him. Whatever He gave me, whatever I knew about Him, I loved. That's all I can know."

Castiel stared at him quietly, thoughtfully.

_God is love_, it's been said. God is, apparently, many things.

It's been a long time since Castiel had been unsure of his mission. When he had been told to raise a soul from hell, he could not believe it, but did as he was told. Dean Winchester was an ordinary man, wasn't he? Even his extraordinary love is one in a long list. He is not even the first good man to find himself in the bowels of hell; it is not that one's lifetime of goodness is unrewarded, negated by a demon-deal. The punishment arises from the absolute rejection of faith and trust in God, the severance of ties, to write oneself off, and the possibility of salvation so decisively.

And here they were again, weren't they?

Dean, giving up his soul for Sam. Giving it up to anyone who would take it, God or demon, whoever would take it, all for Sam.

What would make this instance different from the last one? Dean Winchester loved his brother as much, was willing to sacrifice as much. Does this mean he would be saved again also? Or is the assumption that he was supposed to have learned, after his first deal?

_Learned what_? Castiel wondered. To love his brother less? To know what hell tastes like and cut it from his life forever? To work a different, less risky profession?

_Learned what_?

"I find," Castiel said, wistfully, "That nothing of what has once saved you has changed. You are as you have always been."

"So what about it?" Dean asked.

"Maybe this is not your test, but mine."

" " "

Sam had woken up to a lot of odd places in his life.

One wacky motel room after another, hospitals that have ranged from dismal to tackily ultra-modern. Houses, he's woken up to too. Fields, basements, caves, forests, warehouses, farmhouses, storage sheds, malls, stores, shops, cars, trucks...

The marble beneath his back was cold.

He was looking up at the dull gray of high, majestic ceilings, curving up to heaven, painted in a faux-paradise-sky.

_This is not the real thing_, he thought, _I'm not dead..._

_I'm not dead_!

He sat up, hand falling to his belly, waiting to feel pain, the slickness of lifeblood shed and lost and losing more. The shirt was frayed and stained. He was whole.

The realization turned said-blood cold.

_Dean._

_What. The. Hell. Have. You. Done. Now._

He looked around him.

Church.

_Church? _

He's never woken up in a church before.

Come to think of it, he's never woken up from a hurt without Dean next to him or hovering over him before either.

His eyes found his brother, back to him, standing in the middle of the middle aisle, right in front of the altar. Shoulders stooped, hands in pockets, head tilted upward. It was a very strange posture; surrender, interest, thought...

"Dean?" he called out, softly, walking up to him. His brother turned toward the sound of his voice, but not fully. Dean didn't look surprised. It was Sam who was taken aback by his brother's lack of anxiety or worry.

He stood beside Dean.

"I'm uh..." said Dean, hesitantly, "I'm kinda confused."

"You're telling me," Sam said, quietly, his voice loud in the oppressive silence, "I was..."

"Dead, yeah," Dean winced, "I know."

"You didn't--"

"No," Dean answered, right off the bat, looking at Sam meaningfully, "Not this time."

"Then how--"

"I was sellin'" Dean said, wistfully, "No one was buying, and I kinda just got you back for free."

"It's never free," Sam said.

Dean glanced at him. "Funny. I was the one who used to say that."

Sam watched his face, carefully. Weighing the look and sound of truths and lies and bumping them against all their turbulent history. Nothing confounded Dean more than others' generosity to, or value of him. He didn't accept it from the people they saved, not from women or children, not from their friends, not from Sam or their father, certainly not from God.

"So I'm kinda confused," he concluded, looking back up again.

Sam glanced up at the altar.

Dean chuckled at himself, self-deprecating, "And uh... I'm kinda, not pleased about this whole God-thing. I mean, is someone watching us like, all the time? Going to the can, jacking off, having sex--"

"Dean!"

Dean smiled at the prude tightly, expression lightening though his eyes were still heavy-lidded and troubled.

"You would think that," Sam said, gently, "You could have just said someone's watching us when we're fighting demons, or when we're injured on the hunt..."

_Or dying and dead_...

"What's the name of this guy?" Dean asked, out of the blue, and Sam deduced he had probably come up with the same thing and didn't want to think about it anymore.

"That's random," Sam commented.

"This guy, you know," Dean said, sounding a little bit frustrated with himself, "Remember when we were younger and we were doing a job with dad in this private school in Boston? The one with the snotty rich kids."

"What?" Sam asked, "Barron, that bully up in--"

"No, no," Dean said, "This guy. This guy, with Jesus and he didn't believe it was him."

"Doubting Thomas, bro," Sam said with a surprised laugh, "You don't talk about a saint and say 'This guy,' dude, it sounds like someone we met at a bar yesterday."

"Whatever," Dean said, waving his hand carelessly.

"What about him?"

"I just remembered," Dean said with an embarrassed shrug, and scratching the back of his head uneasily, "I'm like a thorn on God's side, you know. Always poking, checking, like, 'dude, can I touch it? Is it for real?'"

Sam smiled a little, finding it funny that of all things Dean would remember from any school they attended, it would be the story about _this guy_, who, after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, had been visited by Him and wouldn't believe it until he saw the injuries Jesus had suffered from, including touching the wound on His side. The Doubting Thomas-thing was one of the Church's most popular contributions to pop culture and colloquial speech.

"_Intra tua vulnera absconde me_," Sam recited, making Dean look at him with an arched brow, "It might be a better thing to do with God's wounds, than poking and prodding it."

"What the hell is it, Latin geek-boy?"

"'Within your wounds, hide me," Sam translated, "It's an old prayer."

"Prayer," Dean snorted, "I'm not sure I can go that far yet."

"You were ready to go further to save me," Sam pointed out, "Maybe you should go on the preventive side, bro, instead of just starting after one of us gets hurt."

Dean looked at him sourly. "Well I'm not gonna remember that."

"I'll write it down," Sam teased.

Dean's lips curved up into a smile, and he started chuckling. The sound was a comforting rumble, before it broke into a full-on laugh. Sam joined him, and noted, disturbed, that even as his own laughter drifted off, Dean's went on, sounding alien in the church, sounding suddenly heavy and unnatural, hovering in the air, oppressively. Sam watched his brother, who looked like was bordering on relieved, quivering hysteria, laughing even as tears leaked from his eyes.

Dean clutched at his stomach, saying something incomprehensible about Sam and hilarity and it was only half a mad-lie. He folded, and then sat on the marble floor heavily. He sighed, as he shook his head in amusement and dismay. His laughter quited down. He pressed his palms to his eyes. When he started crying, Sam allowed his brother the usual space he required and forced himself to look away.

"You're really funny, Sammy," Dean groaned, and sniffed.

"Yeah," Sam murmured.

"I'm sorry," Dean said, after a long moment of silence.

"You should be," Sam said, sitting down beside him, intentionally letting their shoulders touch, needing the contact, suspecting Dean needed it back, "We weren't supposed to make the same mistakes all over again."

"I know," Dean winced.

"We just got lucky this time," said Sam, "You were selling to anyone who would buy, and incidentally you got a good bidder. But it could have gone all sorts of wrong. I need to know you're going to stop doing this. You told me you were sorry, Dean. You knew what that first deal did to me. And more and more, you should know that being my big brother and needing to look after me is not an excuse."

"I know, I know--"

"'Cos it goes both ways," Sam said, "I'd do anything for you. And... doing what we do... someone's always going to get hurt, likely someone's gonna end up dead. That's how it is. But we can't let that mean someone's gonna inevitably end up in hell afterwards."

"I just wanna die first," Dean muttered.

"You would," Sam sighed, "But we gotta work something out, Dean. This can't keep happening."

"Then stop dying, bitch."

"But it's so much fun."

Dean gave the flat sarcasm a dry, un-appreciative look.

"You wanna save me, right?" Sam asked, earnestly, "But you gotta know, if you put yourself down a dark road, I won't be far behind. You can be sure I'll follow."

"'Cos you're a pain the ass."

"'Cos I'm a pain in the ass," Sam confirmed, "'Cos I've been following you around my entire life."

_Trying to be just like my big brother_, he had once said.

"So you wanna save me," Sam said, "Right? You wanna save me? So you gotta stop this. Do you understand that? The only times I've ever... ever started these freakish power things in earnest was anytime you were in some kind of danger."

He didn't have to enumerate for Dean to know what he meant. _I was here, you were gone_, being the foremost on their list. He's been willing to work with Ruby in a bid to get Dean out of hell. Before that, in a wood cabin and in the midst of the cries of his tortured brother, he tried to use his mind to break his bonds and get a weapon. Even before that, assaulted by the vision of his brother shot in the head, he had used his powers also. To a lesser extent, he had been willing to collaborate with a mad, murderous doctor on a quest for immortality to save Dean.

Dean will die for him. It was a kick in the head, but he had come to some sort of acceptance about it. Dean will very _gladly_ die for him. Somewhere inside him, he's always known it, since he was a kid. Something inside him had learned to accept it. That's what older brothers did, right? And he didn't have the heart to take that away from Dean, to rob him of his one selfishness, which was acquiring Sam's love, earning Sam's admiration.

But for Dean to go to hell for him, to blacken his soul for him, was something he could never accept.

And Sam was nothing if not crafty. If Dean wants to look after him, then he had to understand that Sam's well-being was intricately tied to Dean taking care of himself too.

"If you go down that road," Sam said again, "I'm coming after you. So you wanna save me, you gotta stop this."

"I'll say yes," Dean said, tentatively, "But we both know it's easier to say that now."

"Yeah," Sam winced, "It is, isn't it?"

"So what do we do?" Dean asked him, eyes searching.

"I don't know," Sam sighed.

"I think you need a guardian angel," Dean said, tone wistful, "I got mine to pull me outta hell, dude, you need one that stops you from dying all the time."

"I already got one," Sam said, jerking his thumb at Dean. The casual but profound assertion embarrassed Dean in a very warming, pleasant way.

Dean snorted at him. "I'm not very--"

"Sure you are," Sam corrected him, before he could voice out the rest of _I'm not very good at it_, "I'm here, aren't I? I guess that's why I was never given an official, creepy all-powerful one. I got you. I think I got a really good deal, bro."

"Chick."

Sam shrugged, "Real men wear pink, bro. Ever heard of that? Your over-all butch-ness is like overcompensation for something sorely lacking."

"Whatever."

Sam chuckled at him. Shook his head in an odd mix of amusement and dismay. He sighed.

"So what?" Sam asked, "I guess we just gotta keep on doing what we've been doing, huh? I focus on the work, you look after me, your angel looks after you, God looks after him. It all works out, right?"

"I guess," Dean said, tentatively.

"You know you scare the hell out of me, right?" Sam asked, "Every thing you're willing to do for me, it's all on me, you know that, right?"

"Yeah," Dean winced, "I do. But I couldn't."

_Couldn't stop. Couldn't help it_.

A guy can't just stop a lifetime of orientation, Sam understood that too.

"I guess I just have to be really careful, huh?"

"I'll be careful too," Dean assured him.

"That's all I ask," Sam said, quietly. It was all he could ask.

A shadow appeared on the moonlit aisle behind him, lengthened by the angle of the light.

"You stupid ass!" Bobby Singer bellowed at Dean as he stalked forward, eyes darting between the two brothers, "What did you do?"

Dean sighed, looking at Sam wryly, "I got two scary guys looking after me, Sammy. You're very lucky you got me, bro."

THE END

October 19, 2008

" " "

**AFTERWORD**

" " "

**I. The Ending**

There's a very heavy sense of ambiguity about this ending to me, haha. I guess it's because there are two fairly confusing elements to the ending:

**(1) Castiel's Test**

In the end, Castiel does bring Sam back, guessing that he was being tested by God, and the situation wasn't necessarily God testing Dean. The 'lessons' angle I wanted to parallel with Sam in the episode _Mystery Spot_, when he was the one dealing with a demi-god. Anyway, as was written above, none of the things that have saved Dean before have changed, he was the same man, with the same drive, the same generosity of spirit, the same loves. It was Castiel who was beginning to see things differently too.

**(2) Sam and Dean's Resolution**

I guess I wrote this fic because I wondered if Dean would still be moving heaven and earth to get Sam back if Sam was dying again. I think many fans would agree with me when I say I don't think he'd be able to help himself, haha. But that's just me. I don't know if you'd agree. The ambiguity from this other angle was probably why I had such a hard time ending this story. Sam can't extract a promise from Dean to never sacrifice himself, he knew that. And Dean can make a promise and honestly believe it at the time it's made and still never be able to live up to it if the same thing happened again. So how to end it, especially since if Sam dies a third time, we can expect the same thing to happen again? The most I could do was just for them to be resigned to that dead-end, and just do whatever they've been doing 'cos somehow, life unfolds with the coming out alive and together.

**II. The Characters**

**A. Castiel**

A very, very interesting character. I welcomed his inclusion completely. The actor's depiction is very appropriately unearthly. He has an impatient, immortal vibe, which I find very fitting. His pride kind-of interested me though too, especially as was featured in the _Are you there God?... _episode, where he threatened Dean that he could put him back in hell, being the guy who pulled him out. I guess I could find it in myself to believe in a god that would also challenge that pride, necessitating the possibility that Castiel is also being tested by his missions, including the one depicted in my fic _Tightrope_.

The fic is also told mostly from his point of view, because I liked kind-of fashioning him out to know a lot about the brothers, especially of Dean, being his semi-guardian angel.

**B. Sam and Dean**

In _Tightrope_, I depicted Sam and Dean through Castiel's eyes:

_"The thing about Sam, is that he is all about power. He equips himself, constantly, things that would improve his capacity for success in any situation...(Dean), on the other hand, (is) all about control, the control of situations. As if (he) knew (he) otherwise would not have the strength to weather things beyond it... For all Sam's power, he could never save (Dean). For all (Dean's) control, (Dean) could never stop him from anything... both (are) weakest where (they) long to be the most strong."_

Further, Castiel makes a profession of the future: Dean's desire to protect Sam will be the thing to kill him, and Dean's death by that will be the thing to lose Sam's soul. Sam reiterates this to Dean at the end:

"_So you wanna save me, right? You wanna save me? So you gotta stop this. Do you understand that? The only times I've ever... ever started these freakish power things in earnest was anytime you were in some kind of danger_."

And he thinks back to the instances in the series where he used his powers or skated toward 'the dark side' all because of Dean. I do think that if there was anything in the world that could bring Sam into the dark side, it would be his love of Dean. I think it's perfectly demonically clever to use what is traditionally beautiful and good – love – and distort it for an evil purpose.

The thing about the brother's relationship here that might be a little bit weird, though, is that I'm pretty sure Dean wants to just die before Sam. He would rightfully have a left-behind complex, and I do believe that his one selfishness is to be loved and admired by the people he loved and admired. Sam is his brother, so I figured he is not only well-aware of this, but can also find it in himself to allow it, knowing what it means to Dean. I guess a lot of people would disagree, but sometimes I think Sam is capable of being resigned to the idea that his older brother will one day die for him, and that his older brother will be happy about it. In the end, all Sam could do about a predicament like that is simply to love Dean all the more for it, and to live a life worthy of the sacrifice.

**C. Bobby**

Put this character in any fic and any episode and he just makes it more dynamic. Sometimes you need outside-eyes to highlight some of the brother's traits and this character does it in an unrivaled way. His inclusion made _Tightrope_'s opening feel more intense, and I think I did the same thing for another fic, _Home Road_.

**III. The Theological Slant of **_**Tightrope**_

Tricky, tricky, haha... I was born and raised a Catholic, so the moment my favorite show started touching on this topic in a more palpable manner in Season 4, I was shaking my head in amusement of Kripke's nerve and at the same time, I felt like he was treading on very thin ice that could be great or really disappointing.

I'm quite passionate about the theology of _Supernatural_. I was working out my personal thoughts on it during the drought following the writer's strike. I never found the time to finish the essay, which I was considering entering into a contest at the time. Anyway, it's called _Sure as Hell__**: **__Catholic Schoolgirl Weighs in on the Theology of Supernatural_. I opened it with an anecdote about how a fellow-Catholic friend of mine saw the show for the first time during Season 3 and asked me why Dean would make a deal with the devil first and not with God. She was joking, of course, and it cracked me up, but it did get me to thinking about what the show was saying about faith. The essay answers my friend's question:

"_Fans of the show all know why, of course. In the world of Supernatural, heck, in real life for that matter, it seems far more accessible, efficient, and immediately gratifying to do bad things or deal with bad people than to pray or take the lonely, sacrificing high road of a saint. It seems much easier to throw a rock (or rock salt) at your enemy's head than to turn the other cheek and say, yeah, you can get me on this side too, if you want. Dean couldn't have made a deal with God because if God is out there somewhere, He sure as hell isn't making it very easy to spot Him or have a practical, working relationship with Him. The uncertainty of the existence of a benevolent, omnipotent, God-like figure is firmly cemented in seasons one and two, and it seems unlikely that will change in the future_."

Don't you love a show that surprises you, haha. I sure was wrong about that! Anyway, it goes on:

_"There won't be a God running Kripke's plot machine, this was made clear in one of his interviews. This theological plot guideline sounds about as firm as the no-aliens rule. But the fact that there won't be a God saving everybody at the last minute - depicting an active, meddling figure- is just one aspect of any God-like character. Not having God interfere in the events of Supernatural doesn't mean that the show to date hasn't made any notable, emerging statements on theology._"

So I started asking myself, what does _Supernatural_ tell us about God? Or a god? Seasons 1 to 3 was making us feel that the boys were on their own, their lives a testament to that great theological question of why there was evil in the world, if a benevolent God exists (they're still asking that question in Season 4). I even pulled out one of the parts of this essay for use in my fic _Home Road,_ in a conversation between Sam and Missouri, which also came out pre-Season 4:

Sam: "_Is heaven or hell just geography? I mean, a gate opens and you're out, right, good or bad deeds be damned? Is it just a place you get stuck in? I know for sure even good people end up down there. And if good people get stuck in hell, and bad people can still walk the Earth - god knows people are a lot like demons sometimes - is good and evil just politics? Whoever wins sets the definitions? 'Cos if that's all this is, I don't know what the hell we all are doing here. Trying to save people, trying to get rid of bad things... What's the use?_"

Missouri: "_I don't know why bad things happen to good people, or the converse. You were a law student, you must know the philosophical problem of evil... one of the greatest arguments against the existence of a god, is the presence of evil, right? I don't know if there's a God. I don't even know what I believe. But it seems to me, that anytime there's something bad out there, there's something good that fights it. Every spell, every curse, every monster, every demon. Black and white. Anytime something rough happened to you, your brother was there, wasn't he? Now he's down there but he's still got you. And you've got all of us. It's all about hope. If you want to stretch it a little bit, call it faith. Maybe we're wrong and all of this is for nothing. But the payoff, if we're right, will be brilliant and blinding, and between those two things... the sensible gamble should be obvious for a smart guy like you_._"_

Anyway, the point I'm trying to get at is this: before Season 4, the theological discussion of _Supernatural _was less about canon and more along the lines of general, popular philosophy. The inclusion (though never certain, as we know of these writers and creators) of certain figures like angels and the mention of God, the devil and the apocalypse has elevated the discussion into a more rigid and risky plain. This plain engages me in a very scholarly level, haha, which is my excuse for bringing in all the Christian allusions in _Tightrope_.

I loved superimposing the image of a man carrying his brother to Jesus carrying his cross, invoking the popular reference of every hero having a cross to bear. I loved invoking the spirit of a church, and giving it nuances, like candles offered to a saint who specialized in praying for the impossible. I loved the idea of Dean being like a "Doubting Thomas." I also loved bringing up the passage from the _Anima Christi_, straight from Sam's Latin-speaking mouth. I sincerely hope that these references didn't offend anybody (one of the reasons why I placed a rating on this fic that would encourage more mature audiences, is for the expected, accompanying level of careful discernment), and added culture, color and realism to the fic.

**IV. The Next Project/s: **_**Underworld **_**and **_**Nightmare Things**_

I've already previewed _Underworld_ in my previous fic, _Stronger_, so that should be coming out soon. Just a refresher, though:

Author:Mirrordance

Title:**Underworld**

Summary:Set Season 4, the Winchesters struggle with each other, Dean's post-traumatic stress syndrome, the Cold Case squad, the ghosts of a prostitute and the street artist who witnessed her murder, and the serial killer responsible still running loose in New York City.

And I'm also working on a very wacky, unconventional fic, likely just to be a one-shot, entitled _Nightmare Things_, which would be an homage to the classic episode _What Is and What Should Never Be_:

Author:Mirrordance

Title: **Nightmare Things**

Summary:Where do illusions go, when their big brothers off themselves with a knife soaked in lamb's blood? The Sam of the Djinn's world makes a wish that he had his brother back... and meets up with Dean and Sam of the real world.

What could be more stressful for Dean than dealing with two Sammies after all, haha... I don't do well with humor though, so even if the premise sounds light, I can promise you right now that the story is going to be far from that.

Anyway, this has gone on long enough. Thanks for reading, c&c's always welcome, and 'til the next post!


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